Sunday, November 16, 2014

Day 74, 75, & 76 - "The Forgotten Coast" that we'll never forget!

Day 74 - 11/13/14 - Port ST. Joe to Eastpoint - This morning we woke up to a chilly wind. Dreading getting out and pedaling we sat in the parking lot of the First Baptist Church until almost 10:30 before we even got out of the bus to get ready to go. The temperature had warmed up to just warm enough to play outside with jackets on so the boys all went out to the church playground. While they were out there the local Mayor showed up to welcome us and meet CJ. Katie was just getting ready to go take CJ to get a hair cut, but stayed to talk to the Mayor. The mayor told us to wait a second and let him go get a person from the newspaper, so we did. After the newspaper interview, Katie and CJ were still planning to walk over to a local barber shop and get CJ a hair cut. The Mayor said he was driving that direction anyways and gave a quick ride over to the barber shop! Once we were there the Mayor even paid for CJ's haircut!

Later in the afternoon we DID finally start riding. We made it 32 miles just into Coastline RV for Eastpoint before dark. As we parked the bus we were in awe of the view from this little campground!


Day 75 - 11/14/14 - Eastpoint to Panacea - Today was another chilly day so again we waited until noon to start riding. Our ride today was GORGEOUS and almost all right along the coastline of the Gulf of Mexico.
We learned that this area is called "The Forgotten Coast" by locals because many seem to forget this part of Florida's Gulf coast and instead go to "bigger" tourist locations like the beaches around Panama City or Clearwater. We were amazed how so much of the coast here is still undeveloped completely. We finished today's 34.6 mile ride around 4:00 at Angelo & Son's Seafood where we had gotten permission to park for the night.
We knew it was going to be cold over the next week and wanted to be sure that we had enough propane to stay warm so we drove about 15 minutes into the town of Crawfordville to be sure our propane tank was full. Because there is no accurate gauge we didn't know for sure how empty it would be but we thought we had used a lot on cooking and the fridge. We got to Wakulla LP about 5 minutes AFTER they had closed, BUT the owner was nice enough to still help us. HE filled the tank and did NOT charge us a dime!! He said it was only 13 gallons low and we probably had plenty to make it the rest of this trip without him filling it at all, BUT we didn't know that before so we were glad for the peace of mind. Now we know that the propane tank is HUGE and can last a long time! Praise the Lord!
We drove back to Angelo & Son's Seafood to park for the night and were invited to come in for dinner. Boy are we glad we did! The food was some of the best we have eaten on this whole trip and possibly the BEST seafood we've ever eaten! They also served some of their dishes with pasta as a side which was perfect for our need for CARBS
Even though everyone's food was delicious, CJ got the Baked Shrimp Feta which we all agreed was the best pick! We've never had seafood like THAT! Yumm Yumm!! To top it all off this was the view from our table as we ate!
Thanks Angelo for making our bellies happy!!

Day 76 - 11/15/14 - Panacea to Perry - Today we rode through the St. Mark's Wildlife Refuge and the Aucilla Wildlife Management Area. There were some of the neatest plants, birds, and roadkill we've seen on this entire trip. We WISH we could have seen some alive animals! We started earlier today around 10am because we knew we had a windy 57 mile to ride so we didn't want to have to ride hard. Most of the ride was boring because it was just trees on both sides, but Craig and CJ rode slow and talked a lot. When we only had about 10 miles left we saw two dead animals within 20 feet of each other. One was a whole, not squished, Armadillo and the other one was an unsquished RED TAILED FOX!  Craig and CJ decided to cut the fox's tail off and keep it for a souvenir, Kenadi was grossed out! CJ is thrilled to have this to add to his "collection" of dead animal parts that includes a tarantula, complete skull of a javelina, and claws pulled off of a mountain lion!
We finished today's ride at Rocky's Campground just outside of Perry, FL. Thanks to the owners of Rocky's for donating our site for the night. The boys (and Kenadi too) were all thrilled to see fire pits at the campsites! It was cold (like under 40 degrees) so we built a fire and Katie made a big pot of Chicken Corn Chowder with egg noodles in it. We ate the soup all up and then played a while. We had a half of a bag of marshmellows left so of course we had to roast them!
There was absolutely no lights out here so the stars were soooo pretty. We are always in complete awe of God's creation!

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